Chromatographic separation of materials, either in liquid or in gas form, is very old, and it is also known to make the process continuous. For example, in Pat. No. 3,076,103, Feb. 12, 1963, to Heaton, a vertical annular chromatographic column is described which is slowly rotated, for example from one to a few revolutions per hour, and materials to be separated, either liquid or gaseous, are introduced in an annular manifold in an upper plate, and at one point samples are removed from a similar annular manifold in a bottom plate. The samples are taken as the materials chromatographically separated reach the bottom manifold, the rate of rotation and annular column height being chosen so that a continuous separation takes place. In this patent, flow through the annular column is only by gravity or, in the case of gas chromatographs, by the gas pressure introducing them. There is no movement by centrifugal force as the rotation is so extremely slow that the centrifugal force is completely negligible.
Continuous separation has also been effected in a circular loop column around which a sample extractor is slowly rotated. This is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 3,062,038, Nov. 6, 1962, to Ayers. Here again, there is no centrifugal force acting on the chromatographic column.
Continuous gas chromatography with a helium eluting gas is also shown in U.S. Pat. No. 3,859,203 on an invention made under a NASA contract and, therefore, owned or controlled by the U.S. Government. The column is horizontal but is not spun to produce centrifugal force.
It has also been proposed to drive gases through a chromatographic column by centrifugal force, some being discharged from an upper outlet and others from a lower. This is described in U.S. Pat. No. 3,016,106, Jan. 9, 1972, to Luft. The centrifugal force is the driving force through the column, and there is no movement through the column with centrifugal force at right angles thereto. A similar column with centrifugal force is described in U.S. Pat. 3,078,647, Feb. 26, 1963, to Mosler.
Electrophoretic separation of materials of suitably different electrophoretic character is also well known, but there has never been described a chromatographic column, with or without electrophoretic action, which is spun rapidly so that particular fractions are removed over short paths by a very substantial centrifugal force moving at right angles to the passage of the materials to be separated through the spinning column.